With growing vehicle sizes and increasing weight from advanced technology and safety features, manufacturers are turning to the use of advanced materials to reduce vehicle weight. BMW is looking to the more widespread use of carbon fiber in its future cars (here's a great video about it), but is already currently considered an industry leader in the use of advanced steel in its cars.

As North American automakers put their vehicles on a weight-reduction plan, they are turning increasingly to a new generation of advanced high-strength steel.

The average vehicle built in North America contains 151 pounds of advanced high-strength steel, up from 111 pounds in 2007, according to data compiled by Ducker Worldwide, a consulting firm in suburban Detroit.

Dick Schultz, Ducker's managing director, predicts automakers will increase usage of advanced steel 10 to 15 percent annually over the next five years or so. The stronger varieties of steel allow automakers to use lighter structural components.

What's the practical limit? Schultz expects usage will top out at about 450 pounds per vehicle. That would be more than half the weight of a typical vehicle's body, bumper and doors.

Right now, Honda Motor Co. and BMW AG are considered industry leaders in the use of advanced steel. But Schultz says all the automakers are making more use of it. "It's fair to say there were early adopters," Schultz said. "But everybody is catching up."

'New steel'

Schultz prefers to call the new varieties of steel "new steel," to differentiate them from the first generation of high-strength steel that has been around for years.

In the 1990s, the steel industry began to promote new steel as a way to reduce vehicle weight and improve a vehicle's crashworthiness.

Steel makers produce it by adding small quantities of alloys -- such as manganese or molybdenum -- then heating the metal above 1,300 degrees Fahrenheit. The result is hardened steel that still has enough "give" to be shaped by a stamping press.

One of the first automakers to make use of advanced steel was BMW, which now uses it in all its models. The 7 Series uses roughly 400 pounds of it per vehicle.